8 Questions to Ask Before Connecting With Your Audience on Social Media

Questions to ask before connecting with your audience on social media

Robin Landa, an author and advertising professor at Kean University, emphasized understanding your target audience’s needs and preferences is essential to create a genuine connection. “This involves keeping track of online discussions about your brand, industry, and competitors to uncover valuable insights,” Landa explained. “By analyzing brand mentions, customer feedback, and competitor activity on social platforms, you can refine your social media plan and optimize your marketing strategies.” 

Sit down with your team to review the following eight questions. Your answers will help you define your goals and craft a brand voice that drives sales while capturing the interest and engagement of your target audience. 

1. How do I determine my brand’s ideal customer persona for social media?

You can’t connect with your target audience if you don’t understand its members. Building customer personas will give an accurate understanding of your ideal buyers. A customer persona — also called a buyer persona — is a realistic representation of your target buyer.

Here are some questions to answer while conducting market research to help you develop accurate customer personas: 

• What are their daily activities? Determine how your ideal customers spend their workdays, including their daily roles and responsibilities. The goal is to see if your business offerings align with their needs. For example, if your brand develops a product or service aiming to automate tedious workday jobs, learn about the administrative tasks your target customers may find frustrating. 
• What do they value? Learn what they value most in the products and services they purchase. This information can help you position your marketing messages. For instance, if your target audience prioritizes customer service, your marketing messages should emphasize your robust 24/7 omnichannel support. If they are parents who value safety, stress your product’s excellent safety rating and trusted reputation. 

To develop a truly comprehensive customer persona, you must also consider your audience’s psychographics, pain points, preferred communication styles, buying behaviors, and favored social media channels (more on this below). This deeper understanding will help you connect with your audience more meaningfully, tailoring your social media efforts to meet their expectations and resolve their pain points.

2. What are my SMART social media business goals?

Before competing with other brands on social media, you must be clear on how using social platforms can help you achieve your business goals. SMART goals are an excellent framework to help you outline what you want to accomplish. SMART is an acronym for specific, measurable, attainable, relevant and time-bound goals. Consider the following:

• Specific: What exactly do you want to accomplish on social media? Break larger goals down into more specific weekly, monthly or quarterly goals per social channel or metric. 
• Measurable: Your social media goals must be measurable so you and your team know when you’ve reached your desired outcome. Include clear benchmarks, such as a specific number of followers or engagement rate percentages. 
• Attainable: Evaluate whether you and your team have the resources and commitment to reach these goals. What obstacles might prevent you from accomplishing your social media goals, and how can you overcome them?
• Relevant: Align your social media goals with your broader business objectives. For example, if your company wants to boost e-commerce sales, focus on creating content that drives website traffic and successful lead conversions.
• Time-bound: Your social media goals must have a clear deadline to keep your team accountable. Consider linking goal achievement to an exciting feature or milestone. For example, if your brand reaches 10,000 followers on Facebook, you could release a highly sought-after new feature. Share weekly or monthly updates within your organization to track progress and celebrate milestones. 

3. Which social media channels does my target audience use?

While operating multiple social media accounts can help boost brand awareness, you don’t have to be everywhere. Focus on the platforms where your target audience spends most of its time. By understanding their preferred platforms, you can tailor your content for maximum impact. For example, if you have a younger audience that likes Instagram, creating visually compelling, image-driven posts would be a priority. 

Consider the following tips to discover which social platforms to focus on: 

• Use data to find your audience on social media. Demographic data and market research can reveal your target audience’s favorite channel. For example, according to Pinterest demographics, 45 percent of Pinterest users have a household income of over $100,000, and more than 60 percent are women. According to Statista, 24 percent of Facebook users are 25-34, while 33 percent are 35-54.  
• Ask your customers what platforms they use most. Surveys and feedback forms are simple yet effective ways to determine which platforms your customers use most often. 
• Research your competitors’ social media usage. Analyze which platforms your competitors are active on and observe the type of content they share. This can offer valuable insights into what resonates with your shared audience.  
• Match your content to your products and industry. Certain industries lend themselves better to specific platforms. For example, if you’re in the corporate sector sharing white papers and professional updates, creating a business profile on LinkedIn and establishing a presence on X (formerly Twitter) are logical choices. For a younger, consumer-focused audience, platforms like TikTok, Snapchat, and Instagram may drive more engagement.
• Consider the best way to use various platforms. Even if multiple platforms are worth pursuing, each account should have a tailored content strategy. For example, Wells Fargo uses Facebook and Instagram to highlight customer success stories, while its YouTube channel serves as an information hub. Each platform engages audiences differently, so customize your content accordingly.

4. How can I ensure my social content gets seen?

You may create compelling, fascinating content, but if no one sees it, your social media marketing strategy is a bust. Consider the following ways to maximize your content’s reach and help your audience find and engage with your social posts. 

• Optimize your profiles. Every social media platform offers a profile area where you can share pertinent brand information. Maximize its potential. For example, link to your brand’s store in your Instagram bio, or use your X profile to showcase your credentials and authority. 
• Use links and hashtags thoughtfully. Add relevant hashtags and links to your posts to draw in interested readers. 
• Work with images and videos when possible. Using video builds brand trust, while images create visually compelling posts. 
• Incorporate customers and followers. Increase engagement by sharing photos of your customers, employees, and behind-the-scenes exclusives. Sharing user-generated content will also act as social proof and improve online brand awareness.
• Use “power words.” Boost brand visibility with power words — terms that connect emotionally with your audience. These words encourage engagement by prompting emotional responses. Analyze your top-performing content to identify the words and phrases your target audience uses to address their needs and incorporate these into your social media messages.
• Monitor competitors’ keywords. Observing your competitors’ keywords can reveal the terms and conversations driving engagement and shares. 
• Create assets around optimal keywords. Once you identify a successful combination of topics and keywords, develop multiple content types, such as videos, blog posts, images and webinars. This approach can engage existing followers and attract new ones. For example, run a giveaway to boost your follower count or improve email newsletter signups with a free lead magnet. 

5. How do I want my audience to perceive my brand on social media?

Your social posts must clearly convey and represent your brand while showing your audience you understand their needs. Here are a few tips to keep your brand authentic, professional and honest: 

• Post educational, valuable content. Follow the 5:3:2 rule for social media, where for every 10 posts, five should be helpful curated content, three should be relevant content you’ve created, and two should be personal and fun. 
• Demonstrate your brand is trusted. Share testimonials and user-generated content to keep your messaging authentic and closer to the customer’s voice. This helps build trust and credibility.
• React professionally to negative feedback. Negative comments on posts are common. Consumers may use a social account’s public platform to share a poor customer experience or vent their frustrations. Treat these comments as an opportunity to demonstrate professionalism and care for your customers. Quickly resolve the problem if possible, or politely request to take the issue offline to resolve it. Avoid ignoring the comment or responding defensively. Remember, your other customers are watching.  
• Maximize positive and constructive feedback. Customers may also leave positive comments expressing satisfaction with your offerings. Respond to these posts with gratitude to highlight their experience — these testimonials can help expand your loyal audience. Additionally, take constructive customer feedback seriously to improve your offerings. 
• Solicit feedback. Take your brand advocacy even further by using polls to ask questions and monitor social media mentions. Asking questions shows your followers you care about their opinions, while their answers provide vital data that can help you improve your target audience’s perception of your brand. Questions or polls are also a great way to express your personality. 

6. How can I differentiate my brand from others on social media?

Standing out from the competition is crucial on social media. Your goal is to showcase your unique brand while creating a value-driven community where your audience feels part of a shared mission.

A key step in differentiating your brand is developing a unique value proposition (UVP). Your UVP should be a clear explanation of how your product solves your target audience’s problem, the specific benefits it delivers, and why customers should choose you over a competitor.

For example, Boss Babe, a private network for female entrepreneurs, offers a UVP centered on advice, expert success frameworks, group coaching and member discounts. This proposition is reinforced by testimonials that demonstrate why it stands out among other women-driven entrepreneur communities. 

After identifying and cultivating a strong UVP, you can build a community of like-minded customers who help you acquire and retain even more customers. 

7. How will we turn social media followers into customers?

Having numerous highly engaged social media followers is a great start, but if you aren’t converting them into paying customers, you’re not generating a positive digital marketing ROI. 

Digital creator Colin Rocker advises brands to consider the entire sales funnel to determine how to nurture leads and turn them into loyal customers. “One of the worst things a brand can do is just start posting on social media and then immediately go viral with no method of capturing that attention or bringing that customer further into their ecosystem,” Rocker cautioned. “Make sure you’re thinking through what you want to drive attention toward.”

Rocker recommends setting up a link-in-bio site to direct your audience to your resources and products. This creates a centralized hub where followers can easily access your online store, blog, videos and more. Providing followers with a clear pathway can guide them deeper into your sales funnel and increase conversions.

8. What social media metrics should I use to measure my success?

Your business goals, social media goals, and the social media metrics you’ll use to measure success are all linked. Here are some examples to help you identify the right social media metrics to track:

• Business goal: Increase sales.
• Social media goal: Increase conversions from social media posts.
• Metrics:
  • Click-through rate: Your click-through rate (CTR) measures how often users click on links in your posts.
  • Conversion rate: This metric tracks the percentage of users who complete a desired action, such as purchasing or signing up for a newsletter.
  • Engagement metrics: Engagement metrics, such as likes, account mentions, and post engagement rates (number of engagements divided by impressions or reach), indicate how effectively your posts drive interest.
• Business goal: Boost brand awareness and perception.
• Social media goal: Engage my brand’s audience on social media.
• Metrics:
  • Reach: Reach tracks how many unique users see your content.
  • Impressions: Impressions are the total number of times your content appears in feeds (being viewed multiple times by the same user counts).
  • Mentions: Mentions refer to how often your brand is discussed online. 
  • Share of voice (SoV): SoV compares how often your brand is mentioned versus your rivals.
• Business goal: Increase customer loyalty.
• Social media goal: Strengthen customer and follower relationships via your social platforms.
• Metrics: 
  • Social sentiment analysis: Social sentiment analysis tools help you monitor online conversations about your brand and what tone is being conveyed. 
  • Direct messages and comments: The number and tone of comments on posts and direct messages reveals ongoing engagement and interest.
  • Repeat engagement: This metric helps you identify followers who consistently like, comment on or share your posts.
• Business goal: Increase website traffic.
• Social media goal: Encourage social followers to visit your brand’s website.
• Metrics:
  • Referral traffic: This metric measures how many social platform visitors go to your website.
  • Bounce rate: Your bounce rate measures the percentage of users who leave your site after only a brief visit.
  • Average session duration: This metric measures how long visitors stay on your site after arriving from your social media account. 

These are just a few examples of metrics that can help you measure your goals. Combining several metrics gives you a clearer overview of your success. 

The dos and don’ts of using social media for your brand

Social media users have specific expectations. If you meet or exceed them, you can win their loyalty. However, missteps can be costly. Consider the following dos and don’ts. 

Dos

• Be authentic: If you make a mistake, acknowledge it and take steps to fix it. Additionally, don’t overuse generic stock photography on your social accounts. Prioritize actual photos of customers and employees. 
• Use short videos: Social followers appreciate videos, which offer high engagement levels. Keep them short (preferably no more than 90 seconds) so followers watch them to the end.
• Post user-generated content: In addition to giving you more content to post, user-generated content is authentic and resonates with followers. Be sure to give a shout-out to the content creator to form deeper relationships with users.
• Stick to a schedule: Post regularly to keep followers’ attention. Maintain consistent post frequency so followers know when to expect new content from you.
• Include hashtags: Hashtags help social media users find relevant content and are valuable for tracking purposes. They are particularly important on Instagram, where you can use up to 30 per post.

Don’ts

• Be overly salesy: Social followers understand you are a business promoting products and services. However, balancing content is crucial. If your account comes across as too sales-oriented, you will lose followers.
• Have a one-way conversation: Interact with your followers regularly. If the online conversation slows, start conversations by asking followers questions or running fun polls. If followers reach out to you, answer them as soon as possible, even if the comment is negative or a complaint.
• Repeat your strategy and tone across platforms: Each platform has a different audience and vibe. Get in tune with your followers’ demographics, preferred content and communication style while maintaining a consistent brand voice.
• Expect instant results: Building a following and engaging with your social followers takes time. Be patient and keep at it. 
• Take haters personally: On most social media accounts, you will eventually encounter an internet troll — someone who is just unpleasant and won’t listen to reason. Respond in a reasonable way and leave it at that.

Jennifer Dublino contributed to this article.